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Dec 24, 2023

Safe Parking lot opens in San Diego, another coming to Vista

The first safe parking lot for homeless people in Vista will open this summer

The first safe parking lot for homeless people in Vista will open this summer and the fourth lot in San Diego officially opened last week.

In San Diego, Mayor Todd Gloria was joined Wednesday by other elected officials and representatives of Jewish Family Service at the new lot in a maintenance yard on Morena Boulevard in Clairemont to announce the opening of the new lot, which has room for 15 cars and 12 camper trailers for homeless families.

The trailers are equipped with beds, showers and bathrooms and are among 20 the city received from the state in the early days of the pandemic. They had sat unused since then.

Like the other three sites, the new Rose Canyon safe parking lot will be run by Jewish Family Service of San Diego under a contract with the city's Homelessness Strategies and Solutions Department.

All together, the lots will provide safe sleeping spaces for 233 households, Gloria said at the opening event.

"A street is not a home, and neither are our parks, our canyons or our riverbanks," Gloria said. "Our goal is to have a program available that meets the needs of every unhoused person our outreach workers encounter in communities in all corners of San Diego."

Gloria had supported a proposed ban on homeless encampments, which he had said would become effective after the addition of more resources to get people off the street. The new safe parking lot was one resource he mentioned, with the other a large safe-sleeping area that would allow people to legally sleep outdoors, which has yet to be proposed.

San Diego County's Capital Emergency Housing Solutions Grant Program provided $1.03 million for the program, and Vista received $65,000 from the same program for its safe parking lot.

San Diego County Board of Supervisors Chair Nora Vargas appeared with Gloria at the opening of the new safe parking lot.

"This is about people in our community, human beings, who need to make sure they have a safe space, a place they can call home," she said.

The lot will operate 24 hours a day and will provide clients access to resources to find housing, employment assistance, credit repair, financial education and other services.

City Councilmember Jennifer Campbell, also speaking Wednesday, noted that studies have shown that 33 percent to 47 percent of people who use safe parking lots find housing within their first six months in the program.

Jewish Family Service CEO Michael Hopkins said most people in the safe parking programs have some sort of income and just need help getting back on their feet.

In Vista on Tuesday, the City Council unanimously voted to contract with Jewish Family Service to operate a 25-lot safe parking program in the Eucalyptus Avenue parking lot at the Civic Center, 200 Civic Center Drive.

The original staff recommendation was to place the program at the Civic Center's Alta Vista Drive lot with a start-up and operating budget of $315,000. After some discussion on the site, council members agreed to instead place the safe parking program at the city's southern parking lot off of Eucalyptus Ave, and they increased the annual budget by $111,000 to add nighttime security.

City Councilmember Katie Melendez first proposed a safe parking program in Vista in January 2022, and Jewish Family Service was selected to run the program that June. Community meetings about the program will be held in coming weeks, and the lot is expected to open by August.

The safe parking lot area will open to clients from 5:30 p.m. to 7 a.m.

Jewish Family Service Chief of Staff Chris Olsen told council members that 70 percent of clients at their lots are experiencing homelessness for the first time, 25 percent are older than 60, half are older than 50, 20 percent have families with children and 14 percent are younger than 20.

Olsen also said 33 percent of people at the Encinitas site have left to permanent housing and 57 percent overall have a positive exit, meaning they found housing or moved into a shelter rather than returning to their car. People stay an average of 46 days before having a positive exit from the site, he said.

One public speaker questioned the choice of the lot's original location over the Eucalyptus Avenue lot, which led to the council discussion about moving it, and three people said they opposed it in their neighborhood.

Vista Homeless Services Program Manager Jonathan Lung said the site was selected because clients could use the Civic Center restrooms that are compliant with the Americans With Disabilities Act.

Melendez said she brought the idea to the council more than a year ago because a number of constituents had concerns about people sleeping in cars in the city.

"Twenty-five spots barely scratches the surface of the need," she said. "But there are so many people sleeping in our parks and their vehicles, and these 25 spots will alleviate the improper use of residential neighborhoods, because that absolutely is occurring right now."